Friday, January 23, 2015

School Climate

No, I do not mean environmental climate, but rather emotional climate.

As many of you know I am on a committee that is concerned with schools providing a safe climate to promote education. So when I received an email the other day about a study on the effects of school climate I was interested.
School climates, suicide and gay and lesbian students: Research on LGBT and youth education
Journalist Resources
Writer: Farah Qureshi
Last updated: January 15, 2015

A 2006 study in the Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology found that the degree to which adolescents feel accepted and welcomed in their schools significantly predicts overall mental health as well as symptoms of depression and anxiety. A positive school climate is defined by the U.S. Department of Education as “the extent to which a school community creates and maintains a safe school campus, a supportive academic, disciplinary and physical environment, and respectful, trusting and caring relationships throughout the school community.” Research from New York University on the impact of school climate on LGBT youth found that victimization experiences were associated with decreased self-esteem, poorer grades and higher absenteeism rates. 
I think it is common sense that when there is a positive climate students will do better and there are many more studies that show this but the question is how do we achieve a safe school climate?

That is the six-four thousand dollar questions and there is no one answer, but the best answer is “It takes a village.”

It is not the students, or the teachers, or the administration, it is all of them plus the community. The community includes the parents, the police, the religious leaders, and the town officials, everyone who make up that community. I did a report when I was an intern about the topic where I found a California Department of Education a 2002 paper, “What We’ve Learned About Safe and Effective Schools“ The report found that anti-bullying intervention had to start early, not just in the middle or high schools, but in the elementary schools. And in an Oregon study said that when elementary school teachers were trained to spot children with anti-social behaviors who were then taught how to play together. The program reduced suspensions from 175 a year to less than a dozen.

We need to have safe schools and schools are required by law to provide a learning environment.

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